Protection Warrior Tank Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities (WoD 6.1)

On this page, we list your Protection Warrior core
abilities and how they should be used together (rotation) in World of Warcraft
WoD 6.1. We also explain when
to use your various cooldowns. Then, we go deeper and present all the subtleties
that you will need to know if you want to excel at playing a Protection
Warrior.

The other pages of our Protection Warrior guide can be accessed
from the table of contents on the right.

The Protection Warrior rotation is based on the priority system presented
below. This does not take into account usage of your survival abilities (we
cover this important topic in a
subsequent section). It only shows you how to maximise your threat and
Rage generation.

Heroic Strike is not on the same global cooldown as your other
abilities, which means you can use it at any point of your rotation. The
reason why we put it in the priority is to show its importance in your
rotation. You want to avoid spamming Devastate once you already have 6 stacks
of Unyielding Strikes, and use them on Heroic Strike.

Execute your normal, single target rotation when the above abilities
are not available (or, in the case of Thunder Clap, do not need to be
used). Alternate your attacks between the different targets, in order to
maintain even threat on all of them.

Shield Block causes you to block all attacks made against you for 6
seconds, while Shield Barrier provides you with a large damage absorption
shield. Due to their exorbitant Rage costs, Shield Block and Shield Barrier
are difficult to use simultaneously.

We cannot stress enough how important it is to understand how to
properly use these abilities. We remind you that we give them ample treatment
in a subsequent section.

4.1. Defensive Cooldowns

Shield Wall should be used before you receive a large amount of
damage.

Last Stand should be used when your health drops to a dangerously
low level, or in preparation for receiving a large amount of damage.

Demoralizing Shout should be used as many times as possible during
the encounter. Try to use it when bosses are dealing particularly high amounts
of damage or when you have no other means of improving your survival.

Spell Reflection reflects the next spell cast against you back to
the attacker. Note that this ability will not work against the vast majority of
spells cast by raid bosses. It usually works against Shadowbolt-type spells
cast by adds. Experiment with it in the encounter, to see if it will benefit
you against any spells.

4.2. Offensive Cooldowns

Berserker Rage should be used on cooldown. It will buff your
DPS and threat generation.

Regarding your offensive cooldowns, it is important to note that, whenever
possible, you should try to stack as many of them as you can. You should also
use your Tier 4 and 6 talents with cooldowns active, whenever possible.

Heroic Throw is worth a mention. This ability can be used at range,
generates a high amount of threat, and it has no cooldown or mana cost. While
the damage and threat generated by Heroic Throw are not high enough to justify
a place for it in the normal rotation, it is an excellent way of picking up
distant adds.

7.2. Resolve

Resolve is a passive ability which you receive for
choosing the Protection specialisation. Essentially, it increases your
self-healing and your own absorption effects based on the amount of
unmitigated damage you have taken in the last 10 seconds, including
contributions from avoided melee attacks. Its value fluctuates with your
damage intake during an encounter, and decays away over about 10 seconds if
you stop taking damage. It has a built-in diminishing returns effect which
limits the increase to 240% of the base healing or absorption value. In other
words, at maximum Resolve your heals do 340% the amount they would do with
zero Resolve.

7.3. Enrage

Each time you score a critical strike with Shield Slam or
Devastate, or when you critically block (thanks to
Mastery: Critical Block), you become enraged, receiving 10 Rage and
dealing 10% increased damage for 8 seconds. This will happen passively, so you
do not need to concern yourself with it.

7.4. Procs

There are two procs you need to watch out for while executing your
rotation.

Each time you use Devastate, you have a 30% chance to get a
proc of Sword and Board. This resets the cooldown of your
Shield Slam, and increases its Rage generation by 5. The buff lasts
for 10 seconds.

Critical strikes with Shield Slam grant you a 10-second buff called
Ultimatum, which causes your next Heroic Strike to cost no
Rage and be a guaranteed critical strike.

Sword and Board in particular is a crucial proc for Protection Warriors, and
this is the reason why, whenever Shield Slam and Revenge are
unavailable, Devastate is the go-to ability.

7.5. Survival Abilities

As a Protection Warrior, you have two abilites that are essential to
staying alive: Shield Block and Shield Barrier. In the
following sections, we will tell you everything you need to know about them.
Then, we will explain when it is best to use one over the other.

7.5.1. Shield Block

Shield Block grants you a 6-second buff that causes you to block
all incoming attacks. It does not have a cooldown. Instead, it works on a
system of charges. Each charge has a 12-second recharge time, and you can have
a maximum of 2 charges.

You can use Shield Block twice in a row (provided that you have enough
Rage) without wasting any part of it. Indeed, using Shield Block while the
buff from a previous Shield Block is still active will simply add their
durations together. For example, if you use Shield Block when you had 3 seconds
left on a Shield Block buff, your new buff will have a 9 second duration.

Shield Block has a high Rage cost of 60, so you must learn to use it
wisely. To know how to best use Shield Block, you must understand what it is
and what it is not effective against.

Shield Block works against physical attacks, but it does nothing against
magic attacks (spells cast at you, AoE spells, DoTs).

Shield Block does not work against all physical attacks. Some attacks, such
as specific encounter mechanics (Impale-style abilities), and abilities that
apply bleeds cannot be blocked.

Shield Block is particularly useful when you are being attacked by
multiple targets.

What all this means is that you want to use Shield Block to mitigate
powerful boss melee attacks. If the boss you are fighting attacks in a steady
and predictable manner, then using Shield Block is easy. If, however, the
boss sometimes attacks faster or harder (going into a Frenzy), then you need to
have Rage in reserve so that you can use Shield Block at the appropriate
times.

7.5.2. Shield Barrier

Shield Barrier places a damage absorption shield on you, which
absorbs an amount of damage (based on and scaling with your attack power).
Shield Barrier has a 1.5 second cooldown, and it costs 20 Rage. However, if
you have more than 20 Rage, then Shield Barrier will consume up to a total of
60 Rage. Any additional Rage past 20 will increase the amount of damage
absorption that it provides.

Unlike Shield Block, Shield Barrier does not stack with itself. In fact,
you cannot cast Shield Barrier while a previous Shield Barrier buff is already
active, unless the amount of damage absorption of your new Shield Barrier is
greater than the remaining damage absorption of your old one.

The absorption effect lasts for 6 seconds, but in practice it will almost
always expire within the first one or two attacks you receive.

Also unlike Shield Block, Shield Barrier works against all types of damage
(excluding fall damage).

7.5.3. Shield Block or Shield Barrier?

The amount of damage that Shield Block mitigates is based on the power of
the attacks it is mitigating. Blocked attacks have 30% of their damage
reduced (60% of it is reduced if your Mastery, Mastery: Critical Block,
procs). Therefore, a very powerful attack will result in a much greater damage
reduction from Shield Block than a weak attack will.

On the other hand, the damage absorption of Shield Barrier is independent of
the incoming damage. Shield Barrier will absorb the same amount of damage,
regardless of whether the attack made against you deals 10,000 or 100,000
damage.

Therefore, when deciding which of the two abilities is better to use against
blockable attacks, you need to look at which of the following two values is
greater:

It is even possible to use both Shield Block and Shield Barrier at once, if
you want to maximise the damage mitigation when facing damage that can be
blocked. Doing so means that, as some damage is blocked, the Shield Barrier
will also be used up significantly slower. While this does cost a lot of
Rage, saving up for it and using Glyph of Unending Rage makes it
viable.

7.6. More on Cooldown Usage

7.6.1. Tier 2 Talents

Depending on which tier 2 talent you choose, you will benefit from some form
of self-healing. Second Wind is entirely passive, so discussing its
usage is a non-issue.

Enraged Regeneration is a self-heal for 30% of your maximum health
(10% instantly and 20% over 5 seconds) that is free of cost.

Impending Victory is a self-heal for 15% of your maximum health,
with a low Rage cost and a rather low, 30-second cooldown. You should always
be prepared to use this spell. In non-emergency situations, you can use it to
simply help out your healers. If you anticipate that a very intense period of
damage will happen soon, you should save it and use it then.

Note that, since all these talents heal you based on your maximum health,
their effects are increased while Last Stand is active.

7.6.2. Tier 4 Talents

Shockwave and Dragon Roar are designed with multiple
targets in mind. While they do good damage against a single target, you must
consider whether or not it is better for that global cooldown to be used on a
Devastate instead. This gives you a chance
to reset the cooldown of Shield Slam (thanks to Sword and Board),
thus generating more Rage and allowing for more frequent usage of
Shield Barrier or Shield Block.

As such, we feel that these abilities should be used whenever you are trying
to maximise your DPS, but if your survival is of the utmost importance, you
should simply use a different ability. That said, given the long cooldown of
Dragon Roar, using it on cooldown is quite doable.

Storm Bolt and Shockwave both have the ability to stun
adds, which can turn out to be a very important damage reduction if the adds
are hard-hitting, so you should always consider using them in this way.
Otherwise, Storm Bolt should just be used on cooldown or for burst threat.

7.6.3. Tier 6 Talents

Avatar and Bladestorm will help you better deal with
roots and snares, and this is definitely something you should keep in mind.
Otherwise, Avatar can be used for a burst of DPS and threat (perhaps under
the effects of other cooldowns such as Heroism or Bloodlust),
while Bladestorm can help with AoE threat.